HP Might License webOS, Says CEO (Video)
Hewlett-Packard’s plans for webOS extend far beyond tablets, smartphones and PCs. Hewlett-Packard CEO Léo Apotheker says the company is planning to make it available to its partners to provide mobility services to their customers.
“WebOS will also be adopted by many partners who provide services to small and medium businesses,” Apotheker said during an interview at D9 today. “Traditionally HP has a strong channel into medium companies. … I happen to believe that WebOS is a uniquely outstanding operating system. It’s not correct to believe that it should only be on HP devices. There are all kinds of other people who want to make whatever kind of hardware they make and would like to connect them to the Internet. We’ll make it available to enteprises and to SMBs. It will run on lots of HP devices.”
But would the company consider licensing it to say, HTC?
Said Apotheker, “It is certainly something we would entertain.”
Speaking at Qualcomm’s Uplinq conference also on Wednesday, WebOS head Jon Rubinstein said that HP isn’t looking to license WebOS broadly, but might consider doing so with a couple of select partners.